Welcome to my Tupac news section. This will be mostly related to album reviews, upcoming albums/releases and even simple references to Tupac's name from artists/the media.  Enjoy.  This section will be updated whenever there is news to report!  However, I will not be deleting old news (which may seem ancient!) until I learn how to archive news!

CRUEL TUPAC RUMOUR

Some of you may have heard the cruel rumour that Tupac will be appearing on Dre's next 'Up In Smoke' tour, which will feature Dre, Eminem, D-12, X-Zibit, Snoop Dogg and others.  I would like to state that my site, 2pac2k.vze.com, will NOT be endorsing this rumour, as I believe it to be untrue.  If you believe this rumour, think about this...

Why would 'Pac appear onstage alongside Dre after his disses?  Surely 'Pac would seem to be begging for publicity by joining 'Gay Dre's' high-profile tour.

Also, The Outlawz are well-known for relentlessly dissing X-Zibit, a sure performer at the event.  

Please do not spread this rumour, as there is no truth in it.

BETTER DAYZ #2 DEBUT

On a positive note, freshly released 'Better Dayz' is set to reach #2 in the US Billboard Charts, and is Amazon.com's number 1 seller.  The album is currently selling over 400,000 units per week.  Let's hope for similar success in the UK.  The new double album is set for release on December 3rd in the UK.  You can pre-order a copy at any branch of Amazon.  Please help the album get into the UK top ten, and give Tupac the recognition he deserves.

OFFICIAL BETTER DAY'Z TRACK LISTING

As Better Dayz has now been released, I can reveal that the official track listing is as follows...

Disc 1:

1. Intro 2. Still Ballin 3. When We Ride On Our Enemies  4. Changed Man 5. F*** Them All 6. Never B Peace 7. Mama'a Just A Little Girl

8. Street Fame 9. Whatcha Gonna Do 10. Fair Xchange 11. Late Night 12. Ghetto Star 13. Thugz Mansion- Nas Acoustic

Disc: 2

1. My Block remix 2. Thugz Mansion 3. Never Call U B**** Again 4. Better Dayz 5. U Can Call 6. Military Minds 7. Fame

8. Fair Xchange remix 9. Catchin Feeling 10. There U Go 11. This Life I Lead 12. Who Do You Believe In 13. They Don't Give A F*** About Us

Click here for my review of the album

BETTER DAYZ READY FOR STATESIDE RELEASE.

More than six years after the death of Tupac Shakur another posthumous double album from the influential rapper is being released.

Better Dayz, due November 26, follows on the heels of last year's triple platinum Until the End of Time and finds a storm of rappers contributing additional vocals to tracks Tupac recorded just before his murder on September 13, 1996.

Anthony Hamilton sings on the first single, "Thugz Mansion," which hit the airwaves on Monday, according to a spokesperson for the project. Nas, Trick Daddy, Mya, Ronald "Mr. Biggs" Isley, Tyrese and the Outlawz are featured elsewhere on the 20-track collection, which features production work from 7 Aurelius (Ja Rule), Jazze Pha (Ludacris) and Frank Nitty (Big Punisher).

Suge Knight and Tupac's mother, Afeni Shakur, executive produced the album, some of the proceeds of which will benefit the Tupac Shakur foundation.

Tupac's music continues to have an incredible influence on popular music, as is evident by Jay-Z's and Toni Braxton's latest singles, which both sample "Me & My Girlfriend".

Better Dayz also comes at a time of peak interest over the rapper's murder, which was the subject of a recent controversial Los Angeles Times investigative report and a documentary.

Since his death, several albums by Tupac have been released, including Don Killuminati: The 7 Day Theory under the name Makaveli, a greatest-hits package and a collaboration album with the Outlawz.

QDIII SPEAKS OUT ON PUZZLING 1988 2PAC INTERVIEW

Anyone in possession of the 2Pac documentary DVD 'Thug Angel' may be slightly puzzled by the bonus footage, which features a 17 year old Tupac being filmed for a TV interview, as Tupac did not start his rise to stardom until 3 years later.  Producer and son of Quincy Jones, QDIII recently revealed that the interview was part of a documentary filmed in 1988 by a local reporter researching inner city kids.  The film was set to feature two interviews with 2 inner city kids (one being Tupac), conducted 10 years apart.  Unfortunately, Tupac did not live to participate in his second interview, which should have been filmed in 1998.

POSSIBLE TRACKS TO MAKE 2PAC'S 'BETER DAYZ'

Here is a list of non-confirmed 2Pac tracks which will possibly feature on his upcoming album, 'Better Dayz'.

Better Dayz
Don't Stop The Music
They Don't Give A Fuck About Us
Changed Man
Fair Xchange
Fuck 'Em All
Mama's Just A Little Girl
Never Call U A Bitch Again
Never Be Peace
What's Next
There U Go
Thug Mansion
When We Ride On Our Enemies.

SUICIDE BOMBER QUOTES 2PAC

2Pac news reports are like busses, you wait ages for one, and then tons come at the same time. The latest news puts a dampener onto the spirit of decent Tupac fans. Recently in Finland Petri Gerdt, a 19-year-old student took a 3kg home made bomb to a shopping mall in Finland and blew it up outside a McDonald’s killing six people and himself in the process. It is believed that he obtained instructions to make a bomb on a chemistry related message board. In his posts on this message board, the bomber quotes a famous 2pac line

"I ain't a killer but don't push me...Revenge is like the sweetest joy next to gettin' pussy".

The bomber, 'R.C', was a regular poster on the chemistry board, and even had the word 'Killuminati' in his board signature.

Obviously, the media is too quick to report the Tupac reference, and inadvertedly blames Tupac and the music industry in general...It's time that the hip hop nation took a stand against such outrageous accusations.

A copy of the posting

B.I.G FAMILY OUTRAGE

An American newspaper which printed the story featured on this page is said to have caused outrage. Shock, fury and an alibi greeted a Los Angeles Times story on Friday that claimed the Notorious B.I.G. paid for the murder of Tupac Shakur. Biggie's family members said they're considering a lawsuit against the newspaper.

BIGGIE SETUP

The Los Angeles Times delivered a bombshell on Friday 6th September when it reported that the Notorious B.I.G. offered gang members $1 million to kill Tupac Shakur and provided the gun used in his 1996 murder. The investigative report, which details the hours leading up to Shakur's fatal shooting, was written by Chuck Philips, who has covered the slaying extensively and spent more than a year researching the case. The Times piece places Christopher Wallace, a.k.a. Biggie Smalls, in Las Vegas on the night of the shooting and details a meeting that allegedly took place between the East Coast rapper and several Crips. Citing gang members who spoke only on terms on anonymity, Philips asserts that not only did B.I.G. agree to pay the killers, but that he also insisted they use his gun, a loaded .40-caliber Glock pistol that he then placed on the table.

"The revelation of Biggie was shocking to me,"

Philips told MTV News on Thursday. "When this came up, I was just, ... 'I don't believe it.' So I went about trying to disprove it in various ways with various sources and that's not what happened. What I ended up writing is what happened." Philips reports that Orlando Anderson, a Crips gang member long believed by many to be Shakur's murderer, pulled the trigger. According to the article, Anderson and several other Crips planned the execution in retaliation for a beating Shakur, Marion "Suge" Knight and their associates gave Anderson earlier that evening after a Mike Tyson fight at the MGM Grand Hotel. Biggie had been feuding with Shakur and, according to Philips, had told the Crips he wanted the rival rapper dead, so the gang members figured they might get Biggie to pay them for the hit. (Biggie's ties to the gang stem from allegations that his record label employed Crips as security guards, although Sean "P. Diddy" Combs, the rapper's best friend and head of Bad Boy Records, has denied it.)

"If you go back to my stories that I wrote prior to this, I never believed hardly anything about [the Biggie/Shakur] feud," Philips said. "People kept telling me it was serious, and I didn't believe it. But apparently it was."

In Philips' article, he noted that "a handful of thugs and East Coast rap associates" were with B.I.G. at the meeting with the Crips. When asked if there were specific names his sources mentioned, Philips responded: "Not that I'm willing to talk about."

Philips said at least one of his sources was in the meeting with Wallace, but he would not say if any were among the four Crips in the white Cadillac that executed the drive-by shooting he so specifically describes. "All I'm going to say is that I think I have very good sources on the story."

In the second part of Philips' report, to be published Saturday, the writer examines the police investigation of Shakur's murder. While Orlando Anderson has long been pinned for Tupac's murder by reporters, police never charged him. Two years after Shakur's death, Anderson was killed in an unrelated incident Philips' report also runs counter to a theory constructed by former LAPD Detective Russell Poole, whose ideas about the murders of both rappers are the subject of journalist Randall Sullivan's book "LAbyrinth." Poole's analysis asserts Death Row CEO Suge Knight arranged to have his label's star rapper killed and that affiliates of the West Coast Mob Piru Bloods gang carried out the hit.

"LAbyrinth" suggests that Tupac intended to leave Death Row, an idea that his alleged conversations with a girlfriend and his firing of Death Row attorney David Kenner shortly before his death seem to substantiate. It also claims that Knight owed Shakur a substantial sum of money and points out that a bullet wound Knight claims he suffered in Las Vegas has never been verified by hospital or police records, or anyone other than Knight himself.

Poole was the lead detective investigating Biggie's murder, an assignment the highly decorated officer picked up not long after he had been looking into the shooting of sometime Death Row employee and LAPD officer Kevin Gaines. After conducting an exhaustive investigation, Poole concluded that Knight, an alleged hitman-for-hire named Amir Muhammed, and a group of rogue cops including convicted bank robber David Mack were all involved in the planning and execution of the murders of both Biggie and Tupac.

Poole eventually left the force, frustrated by what he claims was reluctance by the brass to follow up on his leads. It is his assertion, in Sullivan's book and a Rolling Stone article that preceded it, that several cops were associated with Death Row Records and street gangs and that his bosses simply did not want this information to come out.